i do begrudge what he's done in this fiscal cliff talks. it's been very clear from the beginning that he had no intention to solve the fiscal issues. he's been using this, and i must say with great skill and ruthless skill and success, to fracture and basically shatter the republican opposition. the only, you know, redoubt of the opposition is the house. and his objective from the very beginning was to break the will of the republicans in the house and to create an internal civil war and he's done that. how did he do it? from also insisting from day one after the election that the republicans had to raise rates. there's no reason at all to get the revenue that he needed and that the speaker was offering him that you had to raise rates. obama himself, as you know, said last july, july, 2011, you can get $1.2 trillion by eliminating loopholes, which is exactly what republicans offered him. so why did he insist on the rates? he said that is what he will insist upon, and that was the ultimatum. he did that because he knew it would create a cris